New from Cambridge University Press!

Edited By Keith Allan and Kasia M. Jaszczolt

This book "fills the unquestionable need for a comprehensive and up-to-date handbook on the fast-developing field of pragmatics" and "includes contributions from many of the principal figures in a wide variety of fields of pragmatic research as well as some up-and-coming pragmatists."

Kukú is a previously undescribed southeastern Nilotic language of the Barifamily. It is spoken in southern Sudan and northern Uganda. Kukú has awide variety of verbal affixes. These affixes are involved in a number ofvowel harmony and tone assignment patterns. In this grammar sketch,particular attention is paid to the qualitative morpheme, which functionsquite differently in Kukú than in other Nilotic languages. In Kukú itsdistribution, both with respect to the verbs on which it can appear andthe aspects in which it must appear, is related to a contrast betweentelicity and atelicity. If the performance of the verb has a potentialend-point, and if the aspect is completive, then these conditions aremarked by the presence of the qualitative morpheme. The syntax section focuses on problems in the distribution of the complementizers and in the use of two copula-like elements, one of which is clearly verbal and the other of which is a particle. The phonologicalsection of this description is based on traditional elicitation from aconsultant. The morphological and syntactic sections also draw heavilyfrom texts of various types, ranging from traditional songs to electronicmail.